Digital Demagogue

Authoritarian Capitalism in the Age of Trump and Twitter

Paper $25.00ISBN: 9780745337968
Published
February 2018
For Sale in All Americas and the Caribbean except Canada

Cloth $99.00ISBN: 9780745337982
Published
February 2018
For Sale in All Americas and the Caribbean except Canada

We’re all familiar by now with the ways that Donald Trump uses digital media to communicate, from the ridiculous to the terrifying. This book digs deeper into the use of those tools in politics to show how they have facilitated the rise of authoritarianism, nationalism, and right-wing ideologies around the world. Christian Fuchs here applies an updated Marxist frame, along with insights drawn from the Frankfurt School, to show the pernicious role of social media in the hands of nationalist politicians, and the ways in which it has been used to spread right-wing ideology far and wide, and make it seem like an ordinary part of contemporary political discourse. Fuchs diagnoses this problem in stark terms, but he doesn’t stop there: he also lays out ways to fight it, and analyzes the prospects for pushing past capitalism and renewing the left.

“Christian Fuchs provides a much-needed account of authoritarianism under communicative capitalism. This thorough, empirically-rich study is essential reading for anyone concerned with the intensification of far-right power in a digital age.”

“Trump. Modi. Erdoğan. Duterte. Le Pen. Farage. The list of authoritarian rulers and their henchmen goes on and on. For an excellent guide to understanding Trump and the dangerous worldwide movement he leads, you need go no further than this conceptually rich and empirically detailed book”

For more information, or to order this book, please visit https://www.press.uchicago.edu